14-year-old suspect arrested after student shot at Grant Union High School in Sacramento
SACRAMENTO – The student who was shot at a high school in Sacramento on Tuesday spoke with CBS13 to detail what happened.
Christopher Balan, 17, spoke with CBS13 after he was discharged from the hospital. Since he is a minor, Sacramento police could not confirm his identity, but Balan still had on his hospital wristband, bandages and blood on his shirt.
"I was with my friends at school in the parking lot and this kid walked up to us with a gun and he tried to scare us, but we weren't scared," he said.
Balan said he and his friends tried to chase him back and that is when he got shot in the arm.
"It could have been a lot worse," he added.
Balan is a senior at Grant High who was just a few months away from graduating. Because of this incident, he will be finishing high school online.
Sacramento police say they got a ShotSpotter alert near the campus a little before 10 a.m. Police soon got calls reporting that a student had been shot by another student.
In a message sent to families, Grant Union High School confirmed that a student had been taken to the hospital after being shot.
The student suffered a non-life-threatening injury to the arm and the suspect had been detained. The victim was 17-year-old Christopher Balan, a senior just months away from graduation.
"I was with my friends in the parking lot and this kid walked up to us with a gun and he was trying to scare us," Balan said. He later added that the gun initially jammed, and when he ran after the gunman, "that's when I got shot."
Police noted that the incident was isolated and targeted, saying that there was no outstanding threat to the surrounding community. They added that the suspect, a 14-year-old boy, was arrested just a block away from the school along Balsam Street.
Police said the young suspect has since been booked into juvenile hall on assault-related charges.
Grant High was on lockdown and students were sheltering in place due to the incident. In a message posted to the school's website, parents were being urged to not come to campus at this time. The lockdown was lifted just before 12:30 p.m. and classes resumed for the rest of the day, but parents who wished to pick up their children could now do so at the Grant West campus.
The school district later said families could come pick up their children once Sacramento police give clearance.
Psychologists and counselors will be available for students and staff, the district said.
Grant Union High School is located in the Del Paso Heights neighborhood of Sacramento and is in the Twin Rivers Unified School District. The district released a statement to CBS13 Tuesday evening saying it shares the community's outrage toward this act of violence. The statement continued:
"It's hard to fathom that an alleged conflict between two students escalated to where we are today. We want to assure the community that it's our continued mission to ensure that all children are safe from violence and the havoc it wreaks on our families and the community. We wholeheartedly believe that all children deserve to have a safe, positive and nurturing environment at school, at home and in our neighborhoods."
Twin Rivers said a support team will be available at Grant High for any students and staff who may need to speak with someone.
After a shooting in the parking lot of Grant Union High left a man dead in 2022, the community rallied to try and stem gun violence in the neighborhood.